U.S. Opposes South Carolina Bid to Halt Immigration Lawsuit

Dec. 16 (Bloomberg) -- The U.S. opposed a South Carolina
bid for a court order halting a federal government lawsuit
seeking to invalidate some of the state’s new immigration laws.

Governor Nikki Haley’s administration yesterday asked U.S.
District Judge Richard M. Gergel in Charleston to wait for the
U.S. Supreme Court to review a similar Arizona measure blocked
this year by a federal appeals court before he takes up the
South Carolina case. Gergel has scheduled a Dec. 19 hearing over
whether to bar implementation of the South Carolina laws.

South Carolina’s statutes should be allowed to take effect
as scheduled on Jan. 1, the state’s lawyers said yesterday.

The U.S. responded today that allowing the measures to be
enforced would irreparably harm the federal government’s control
of immigration policy and “create the substantial likelihood
that lawfully present aliens will be harassed with mandatory
demands for verification of their immigration status.”

Lawyers for the state of Alabama, which is also defending
against a federal legal challenge to its immigration laws, has
asked a U.S. appeals court in Atlanta to halt that case pending
the Supreme Court’s review of the Arizona matter.

The South Carolina case is United States v. State of South
Carolina, 11-cv-2958, U.S. District Court for South Carolina
(Charleston). The Alabama appellate case is United States v.
State of Alabama, 11-14532, U.S. 11th Circuit Court of Appeals
(Atlanta). The Supreme Court case is Arizona v. United States,
11-182.